Friday, February 3, 2017

Trump and Bonapartism: Reply to a reader

The Socialist
Workers Party does not have one policy during Republican administrations and
another for Democratic administrations.

*

John B. writes:

You may remember
that a few months ago I asked why the SWP did not characterize Trump as a
Bonapartist, since he would seem to fit the definition to a "T." Back
in the '90s they were very quick to describe Ross Perot, Patrick Buchanan and
even Jesse Ventura this way.

I know you're not a
member of the SWP, or even an "organized supporter," but since all of
a sudden you're posting articles on the subject, I suspect a line change is
imminent, and it will now officially define Trump as a Bonapartist. The problem
this poses for them is if they admit it now, the whole edifice of their
orientation toward the "Trump Movement" for the last year and a half
comes crashing down in a heap. What to do?

My reply:

This blog has posted several articles in the last few days on the
Marxist concept of Bonapartism. I am
currently reading Hal Draper's 1977 book Karl
Marx's Theory of Revolution Volume 1: State and Bureaucracy. Chapters 15-18 of that book cover the
development of Bonapartism as a scientific classification by Marx and
Engels. They did this while studying
living events in France and Germany, focusing on the rule of Napoleon III and
Otto Von Bismarck.

The value of Draper's discussion of Bonapartism is that he grounds the formulation
in its historical context, and does not deal with it as an academic
abstraction. Marx and Engels identified
Bonapartist elements in the rule not just of Napoleon III and Bismarck, but also
Simon Bolivar and several absolutist monarchies in Europe.

The Bonapartist leader, they concluded, was primarily a semi-autonomous
arbiter, pretending to be "above" all contending classes, but in fact
defending the dictatorship of capital in periods of crisis and
polarization. The Bonapartist leader
defended bourgeois rule against the threat of working class organization and
political action, and also against threats from capitalists or layers within
the ruling class. [Hence Bismarck's
harsh treatment, "for their own good," of Junkerdom.]

Is Trump a Bonapartist?

I disagree with John B.'s statement that Trump is a definitive
Bonpartist. Draper makes clear that
under bourgeois rule, with its autonomously functioning capitalist state
machinery, there are always elements of an arbitrator function, and of
arbitrary executive rule. The U.S. government since 1930s has certainly seen this
Bonapartist tendency, as have state and city governments.

The 1990s saw the emergence of figures in bourgeois politics who
rejected Republican and Democratic political parties. I would call Perot and
Ventura premature wannabe Bonapartes.
They presented themselves as "decisive men" and nominated themselves
for the role. The appearance of such figures, and the increased use of
exclusively executive powers, are complimentary phenomenon.

Donald Trump has presented himself as an arbitrator, but exclusively
within the context of salvaging the fortunes of the Republican Party, not
rejecting it.

The Republicans are
being remade by Donald Trump, a multibillionaire pretending to speak in the
interests of working people while seeking to find policies that further enrich
the capitalist class, in a futile attempt to end the inevitable crisis of their
system. This has nothing to do with hysteria about “fascism” among liberal and
middle-class radicals, Barnes said. In fact, the Trump electoral victory is
weakening already marginal ultra-rightist currents, who are unable to gain any
traction in U.S. politics. [Source]

Likewise, Trump's use of executive orders is in continuity with the
practice of previous
U.S. presidents in the modern era.

One executive order
issued by Trump on Jan. 25, titled “Border Security and Immigration Enforcement
Improvements,” states that it is government policy to extend the wall on the
Mexican border, speed up deportations, expand immigration detention facilities and
add 5,000 Border Patrol agents.

The order traces its
continuity to the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act
of 1996, signed by then President Bill Clinton. The average daily population of
men, women and children held in immigration detention centers soared from 8,000
before the law to 34,000 in 2014.

I do not speak for the U.S. Socialist Workers Party. I support its program and activity, as do
hundreds of others. My knowledge of the
party's politics and approach is based exclusively on my reading of the party
press. Based on this understanding, I
reject the statement that the party has had an "orientation toward the
'Trump Movement' for the last year and a half”.

The Socialist Workers Party has an orientation to the working
class. This is carried out where party
members happen to work, as well as in cities where party branches take their
literature and program door-to-door in an undifferentiated way in working class
districts.

In 2015-2016, this orientation included joining fellow workers at
Democratic and Republican campaign rallies.
What party members found in discussions at these events was that workers
rejected the Clinton campaign's "Things are great" message. Trump's demagogy, within the two-party
straight-jacket, looked to many like a chance to effect the intolerable status quo. But the SWP has never given
an inch to the idea that Trump’s campaign could be a political vehicle; it
rejects any suggestion Trump is a tribune for workers.

This is in stark contrast to the approach of a galaxy of bourgeois
Democratic Party pundits and promoters, and petty bourgeois left and radical
movementarians and activists. They
flattered themselves that supporters of Democratic Party demagogue Bernie
Sanders were pay dirt for a new socialist movement in the United States. These same characters, who eight years ago
said they would "make Obama keep his promises" by their mass street
actions, spent most of 2016 conducting street actions to disrupt and attack
workers interested in checking out Trump events.

The Socialist Workers Party does not have one policy during Republican
administrations and another for Democratic administrations.

This alone makes the party unique in U.S. politics. No other party in this country can say the
same. Quite the contrary! Today liberal-left organizations, media, and sundry outfits
attempt to whip-up hysteria among former Clinton and Sanders supporters around
issues [abortion, immigrant rights, "imperial presidency"] they have
accepted with stunning complacency for the last eight years.

What does the Socialist
Workers Party counterpose to this lesser-evil
Groundhog Day?

The propertied
rulers’ capitalist system is in deep crisis today, facing declining profit
rates, contraction in production and trade, and growing conflicts over resources
and markets. The deepening competition between capitalist rulers worldwide has
produced growing carnage, devastating economic crises and dispossession of
millions of human beings around the world. Washington and other imperialist
powers have engaged in nonstop wars since the turn of the millennium in Iraq,
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Yemen, Syria and elsewhere.

Workers need our own
party to organize independent of the bosses and their political parties, to
defend our interests on the road toward taking power out of the hands of the
capitalist rulers. The Socialist Workers Party is your party.

Let’s fight
together: Unionize all workers! No deportations! Speak out against attacks on
Muslims and mosques! All U.S. troops out of the Middle East!